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When Nana gave us rice pudding and jam we knew all was forgiven

Family Fortunes: Standing 5.9 in her stockinged feet, she dwarfed my grandfather

That evening for supper she produced a queen of rice puddings with jam set on filling our empty bellies.

Mary Galvin
Fri Aug 3 2018 - 05:00

She was big boned, my grandmother, her bingo wings flapping in the early summer breeze as she waved my parents goodbye. Leaving us in the care of our grandparents, they were off to England to visit my two older brothers, who had emigrated the year before.

Nana, as she was known to us, was not a woman to be trifled with. Standing 5.9 in her stockinged feet, she dwarfed my grandfather. As we stood either side of her on that summer’s morning, we knew that the coming days would be challenging to say the least.

Sure enough, after breakfast the following morning, the pattern was set for the days that followed. Without ceremony, we were ordered outside to play in the garden, the kitchen door locking audibly behind us. We were under strict instructions to remain there, until summoned for our dinner. A meal to be feared and desired in equal measure.

The garden was my grandfather’s domain, growing all sorts of fruit and vegetables. He dressed formally for the occasion looking a bit like Winston Churchill. His pinstripe trousers ballooned over his belly, held up by braces that defied gravity; and all the while the scent of Sweet Afton wafting into the air above his shiny baldhead. A man of few words. Stern in his demeanour. His expression only softened at the sight of my grandmother.

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Rebel

After a few days of grinding boredom, we decided to rebel, and left the garden, heading home to play with friends, certain we would not be missed. We returned at lunchtime confident in our deception. The kitchen door was open, pots simmering on the stove. Nana emerged from the dinning room, tea-towel in hand and a face like thunder on her. Catching my brother by the arm she was bent on walloping the living daylights out of him.

“Where-were-ye? I-was-out-of-my-mind-with-worry. Wait-till-I-tell-your-Mother.” The wallops syncopated with her words.

Like some crazy dance they went in circles round the kitchen. She walloping, and he shouting. Climbing on to a nearby chair, I launched myself on her back, the three of us going round in circles, shouting and screaming and walloping.

It all stopped with a roar from the grandfather. Sent to our rooms without any prospect of dinner, we could hear the muted tone of my grandfather’s voice, gently chiding my grandmother.

That evening for supper she produced a queen of rice puddings with jam set on filling our empty bellies. All was forgiven.